Newtown faces Christmas

Holiday spirit pushes through in wake of unspeakable tragedy

By CHRISTOPHER SULLIVAN

Associated Press

NEWTOWN, Conn.

Bells and lights and gifts: These have always shown us it’s Christmastime. But this year, in this town, the bells toll in mourning. The brightest lights glare from TV satellite trucks. And gifts? Some around town suggest that presents and other rituals really ought to be put off in this joyless season.

Could anyone imagine celebrating Christmas under the pall that has spread here since the horror at Sandy Hook Elementary School?

The answer, somehow, is yes. The spirit of Christmas has pushed through, even here, where people are seeing lights and hearing bells in ways they never had before, and reminding themselves which gifts are truly most precious.

The outpouring of caring that followed the tragedy has been an especially treasured gift. The weekly Newtown Bee’s special edition on the shootings gave two full pages to sympathetic, prayerful notes from across the U.S., from Britain, South Africa and many other places, including Norway, which lost 77 innocents in a massacre last year.

From Alberta, Canada, truck driver David Lenzi wrote of pulling off the road, overcome, when he heard of the tragedy. He sent condolences to the town, and added: “I have heard media reports of people taking down Christmas decorations. I request that this stop happening.” Instead, he suggested, let Christmas be a celebration of the lives lost and “a beginning of ... healing.”

Right after the shootings, many did choose to turn off lighting displays that had glowed with holiday joy in their yards since early December.

The row of light-up candy canes and strings of icicle lights at Jose Marin’s house went dark, and the reindeer, snowman and circus train remained unlit for five days after the tragedy, which hit close to home. One of the children who died was on the same swim team as his daughter.

But words he heard at St. Rose of Lima Church helped persuade Marin to turn the lights back on. “The priest said it was not fair to the other kids,” he said.

And then his niece begged to see the twinkling display. She’s just 3, too young, of course, to understand how horror could intrude on the holiday.

The lights became a theme for clergy; they spoke of light in darkness, noting the guiding star at the center of the Christmas story and the candles at the heart of Hanukkah.

Banks of candles glowed in each of the dozens of impromptu shrines around town, their light falling on teddy bears and other toys, symbolic gifts for the lost children, and on uncounted notes.

Yet if the tragedy’s intrusion cannot be denied here, neither can Christmas.

Mike Zilinek, a 72-year-old retired deputy fire marshal who has lived in Newtown since 1946, choked up acknowledging the grief that “still comes in waves.” Nonetheless, he can’t wait for his sons and their families to arrive for Christmas.